Here is a quick look at internet fax services. Internet fax services are a way of sending fax messages over the web, just like an email. It does this without the aid of any fax machines. And more importantly, web faxing is cheap, fast and easy to use, and hence is a big money and time saver. First, let us see how online fax services work. Once a customer subscribes to an internet fax service, the service provider assigns him/her a unique fax number. This is the address to which other people are supposed to send in their faxes. The subscriber can receive fax messages in the form of an email, for which he/she may have to create an email account with the service provider domain. To an extent, this is quite similar to the normal electronic mail. In order to send a fax message, what the user has to do is to type the message in the text space of the electronic mail, and press the send button, the mail being addressed to the recipient in the form 'fax number@service provider's name'. The sent message then goes to the network based server of the service provider, where it is converted into a suitable file format before eventually forwarding it to the recipient's mail box or fax machine, whichever is applicable. The latter one is called e-fax, which is a new technology and is a bit more costly as it requires some additional software and hardware component installations. Some of the online fax service providers offer the services for free, while some others charge a definite fee. If it is a free service, the facilities will be limited, and most companies make such a free offer to entice customers to subscribe for a meaty deal later on. But, even if the fax service is for a fee, still the amount is nominal in many counts, especially given the flexibility and scope of this facility. Further, one does not need any costly equipment to use internet faxing. One can manage to send web faxes with a PC and a fast internet connection. To sum it up, email faxing is an intermediate technology that bridges the gap between traditional fax machines and web-based communication. It eliminates the complexity and operation cost of the bulkier fax machines meanwhile embracing the quickness, flexibility and low cost aspects of web communication. After all, this is what an average customer wants from technology! Good Luck! |
